Leading Article: Silence is the key to his survival

THE PRINCE of Wales is well-known for what many of his plainer subjects might call his loopy beliefs. Modern architecture aside - his plainer subjects go all the way with him there - his views and interests do not coincide with the great and humdrum broadstream of British public opinion. But no harm and perhaps some good has been done; more of us may know a little more about the psychology of Jung, about the 'holistic' approach to life, about crofts in the Hebrides and bushmen in the Kalihari desert. Now, however, he has fallen for the loopiest belief of all, the idea that 'public relations' will restore him to popular respect. The conversations between him and his advisers are easy enough to imagine. 'But why should I help with this biography?' 'Sir, your subjects need to see you as a fully-rounded human being.' 'You mean bonking outside the marital bed and all that?' 'Why not? Your subjects know it happens to the best of us. And you were driven to it, sir, driven to it.'

Buckingham Palace is right to be anguished at the result. As an anonymous Cabinet minister says in today's Mail on Sunday: 'He is supplying the oxygen of publicity to this difficult situation (his broken marriage). They have opened up a Pandora's box and will never be able to satisfy the public's prurience. I would just like to know what the prince thinks he is doing.' What should the heir to the throne have done? Nothing. He should have shut up, and let his public reach the conclusion that his wife was a vapid, vain, neurotic and manipulative woman. The prince is no Einstein himself, but even he should be able to grasp that the British monarchy depends for its survival on opacity, mystery and public rectitude. Instead, he is behaving like his wife, and like a fool.

(Photograph omitted)